BBBBBBBrrrrrr...eeeeee...rrrrrrraaaaaa....
I guess I am old enough to remember that sound of a dial-up connection to the internet. Ok, I definitely remember dial-up and yelling to my wife that she couldn’t use the phone because “I’M ON THE WORLD WIDE WEB!”
AOL is flatlining dial-up service. At the end of September, it will be dead.
The creaky door to the internet was characterized by a once-ubiquitous series of beeps and buzzes heard over the phone used to connect your computer online — along with frustrations of being kicked off the web if anyone else at home needed the landline for another call, and an endless bombardment of CDs mailed out by AOL to advertise free trials.
I remember getting those CDs in the mail. Sign up for your free 30 hours on the “WWW.”
AOL dial-up is more outdated than a horse and buggy. The Amish still use the latter, and likely never used the former.
AOL, the company previously known formally as America Online, is discontinuing its Dial-up internet service after 34 years.
The service will shutter on September 30, meaning "the associated software, the AOL Dialer software and AOL Shield browser, which are optimized for older operating systems and dial-up internet connections, will be discontinued," the web service provider said on its website.
"We are discontinuing the dial-up internet service component included in certain legacy AOL Advantage, CompuServe, and Netscape Connect Plans as we innovate to meet the needs of today’s digital landscape," a spokesperson for Yahoo – which counts AOL among its brands – said in a statement to FOX Business.
"This change does not impact the numerous other valued products and services that these subscribers are able to access and enjoy as part of their plans. There is also no impact to our users’ free AOL email accounts," the statement continued.
That last line brought me back to two clients I had. Both had AOL email accounts, and even 10 years ago, I wondered why they still had AOL accounts.
“That screams you’re old... do you also have dial-up?"
Neither of them thought that was funny. They still have their AOL accounts.
I was in Bend, Oregon, recently. It has the only remaining “Blockbuster” store in the nation. At least the storefront is still there. I recall going into Blockbuster with my kids and wandering the aisles looking for a movie to watch that night. I also recall my Netflix account being a by-mail service. I would peruse titles and order them online. A disk would arrive in the mail. Once we were done watching it, I’d mail it back to Netflix.
I recently wrote about NPR lying about the need for its services. NPR (and its sister entity PBS) kept pushing its myth that there's a vast cohort of Ma and Pa Kettles who watch black and white TV, and that TV is stuck on PBS. Now AOL dial-up, along with NPR and PBS, is going the way of the dodo.
I (reluctantly) admit that I remember 8-track tapes and remember that my parents owned one TV. It was color, by the way.
My buddy Ward Clark admitted that he had to change the belt on a car radio/8-track player every year – I guess because he played it too much? I thought there was a squirrel on a treadmill.
And so an era ends. BBBBBBrrrrrr...eeeeee...rrrrrrraaaaaa.... is dead. Long live the router.
Come on — admit it, some of you still have 8-tracks in the garage because "they sound better" than digital, and you're hoping for a comeback
BBBBBBrrrrrr...eeeeee...rrrrrrraaaaaa.... nooooooo
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